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The world's biggest climate negotiation opened in Antalya on Monday — and this year, the organisers are promising something different. COP31, the 31st UN climate summit, runs from November 9 to 20 with 197 parties at the table, and its presidency says the goal is no longer another round of pledges. It is turning the pledges countries have already made into things that actually happen.
That sounds modest. In climate diplomacy, it is the hardest promise of all — and the two weeks ahead will test whether it survives contact with the politics of money, energy and fossil fuels.
What COP31 is, and who is running it
According to reports from the Council on Foreign Relations and CNBC TV18, the summit is being held at the Antalya Expo Center in Türkiye under an unusual arrangement: a shared presidency. Türkiye's environment minister Murat Kurum is the conference president, while Australia's climate minister Chris Bowen is leading the formal negotiations. A World Leaders Climate Action Summit follows on November 11–12, bringing heads of state and government to Antalya to push for political commitments early in the talks.
The agenda is built around implementation. Alongside the formal negotiations, the presidency has set out an Action Agenda organised around ten themes — zero waste, oceans and seas, food safety, climate-resilient cities, green industrialisation, clean energy transition, youth and education, and resilient health systems among them.
The 35-by-35 pledge
The headline initiative is the 35-by-35 Global Electrification Pledge: raising electricity's share of final energy consumption to 35 percent by 2035, up from about 23 percent today. Electrification — moving buildings, industry, transport and agriculture away from burning fossil fuels and onto clean power — is the presidency's chosen lever for cutting emissions, and securing a global commitment behind it is one of the summit's central aims.
There is also a newer item on the agenda that no earlier COP had to face: artificial intelligence. The rapid expansion of AI and data centres is driving a surge in electricity demand, and COP31's science, industry and technology agenda includes whether that demand can be met with renewable energy and cleaner grids — or whether it becomes a new excuse to keep fossil plants running.
Why finance will be the fight
If one issue decides whether COP31 succeeds or stalls, it is money. Developing countries are seeking greater and more predictable funding for cutting emissions, adapting to climate impacts and building resilience, while developed nations face pressure to turn existing financial commitments into actual flows. Negotiators will look at scaling transition finance, putting Article 2.1(c) of the Paris Agreement — aligning financial flows with climate goals — into practice, and access to the Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage.
The backdrop is stark. The UN Environment Programme's 2026 Adaptation Gap Report, published on November 4, offers a sobering assessment of how far developing countries still are from the finance they need to cope with rising temperatures and more severe disasters. Adaptation — preparing societies for impacts already being felt — sits alongside finance and the fossil-fuel question as one of the summit's defining tests.
What to watch in the next two weeks
On fossil fuels, the familiar standoff returns: how to treat them in the final text, after last year's summit failed to mention them explicitly. Brazil's COP30 presidency published a voluntary global roadmap for phasing out fossil fuels earlier this month — but it is a call to action, not a document to be negotiated at COP31, though it will be discussed in Antalya on November 10. Our explainer on that roadmap is here.
The honest measure of COP31 will not be the speeches on November 11. It will be whether, by November 20, countries leave Antalya with finance that actually flows, electrification targets they intend to keep, and adaptation plans backed by real money. The presidency has framed the stakes plainly: the promises exist; what is missing is delivery. Two weeks from now, we will know whether that gap has started to close — or simply been restated in new language.